Recent cases of ‘phishing’ have been brought to light involving the Bank of Spain and three other well-known high-street entities.

The Asociación de Internautas (surfers’ association, known as AI) has detected a number of suspect emails being sent to net users purporting to be from the Banco de España, Banco Santander, Caja del Duero and Caja Madrid.

In all cases, the potential victim receives a mail bearing the bank in question’s logo requesting the account holder’s online banking password, PIN number and other confidential information, usually on the pretext of performing a routine security check.

Recipients are warned that failure to produce such information could lead to their account being suspended.

Representatives of AI stress that no bank would request data like this via email since they have permanent access to all accounts. Any message of this type is likely to be fraudulent.

AI recommends that anyone who suspects they have fallen victim to a ‘phishing’ scam should contact the police and the bank in question as soon as possible.

To help AI in its campaign against ‘phishing’ attempts, forward all messages of this type to phishing@internautas.org.